Alex Guerrero’s increased influence over Patriots players causing friction?

The story of a rift that has developed between Tom Brady’s personal trainer and New England Patriots head coach Bill Belichick is one that just won’t go away, and there could be more to it than the team is letting on.

It has been reported at numerous points this season that there is “some sort of issue” between Alex Guerrero, the co-founder of Brady’s TB12 Sports Therapy Center, and Belichick. Most recently, a Boston Globe article revealed that Belichick has stripped Guerrero of many of the privileges he once had with the Patriots, including traveling with the team and being on the sideline during games. So why the seemingly drastic change in relationship?

According to Albert Breer of The MMQB, the rift between Guerrero and the Patriots has nothing to do with Guerrero’s relationship with Brady. Instead, Belichick and the team are bothered by the “recruitment of players to work with Guerrero as he and Brady spread the gospel of the TB12 Method,” as Breer puts it. There have also been rumblings that Guerrero has undermined some of the work New England’s training staff has done with players.

The results Brady has gotten speak for themselves. He’s a 40-year-old quarterback who is the frontrunner to win the NFL MVP award this year and could be on his way to winning a sixth Super Bowl. Rob Gronkowski is also giving a big boost to the TB12 brand, as the oft-injured tight end revealed before the season that he has been working with Guerrero. Gronkowski is playing as well as ever despite undergoing his third back procedure last year. Julian Edelman, who tore his ACL prior to the season, said last month that he has been rehabbing with Guerrero.

“I come in and do my rehab, then I go up to TB12’s Center and I do more rehab and then I come back here and do a little more rehab,” Edelman told WEEI. “I go home and these past few weeks have been pretty busy. I had the whole pop-up shop this past weekend. We did a book tour during the bye week. Mostly, all my time and energy are into getting this knee right and getting this knee back.”

Belichick has said in the past that players are always encouraged to seek second opinions, but you can understand why the Patriots would be bothered if Guerrero is making their medical staff look bad. Guerrero uses some untraditional methods like holistic medicine, and a Boston Magazine article from 2015 went into detail about how the Federal Trade Commission discovered he was pretending to be a medical doctor and claiming he had products that could cure cancer and concussions.

Again, Brady’s history with Guerrero speaks for itself. Ideally, Guerrero and the Patriots’ training staff would work together to in an attempt to get the results Brady has achieved with every player on the roster. For whatever reason, the two sides do not seem to be getting along. If you want to know exactly why that is, don’t bother asking Belichick about it.